Resurrection
by nightbird47
Summary: There is a difference between surviving and being alive.  What was it like to be a refugee somewhere in the fleet?  OC characters


I don't own the world of BSG, but am very glad I can play in it. This is my first story for BSG and I'd love to know what you think of it.

Resurrection

She bundled up all the loose things, tying them into her blanket, holding tight to the travel bag she had once planned to take on the trip to visit her family. The crowd was pushed out of the compartment with the leak, and shuffled along to find a spot somewhere else to put themselves. It was hard. They'd been together for a little while and knew each other. Now she'd have to dredge up something of herself all over again. Someone pointed her down a small corridor, the air colder than where she'd been. She followed the others, wondering where they end up this time.

"We cleared out some space over there," someone said with a shout, and the mob of misery turned towards a small bay, hardly closed in, but with some space where they could go. For now, she hoped. They fixed the leaks because they had to. Maybe they'd get to go back where she had gotten a little comfortable.

The ship was old, barely in condition to survive jumps, but they took their chances. If it hadn't been they'd be dead. She had very little, just the case, mostly packed for overnight if her flight had been delayed, grabbed as she'd run. And the blanket and small pillow she'd been given by someone from the military. She wore the only shoes she had, and was very lucky to have a change of clothes. She guarded it with her life.

All else was gone. The husband. The children. The things, all burned to ash by the bombs. Or had some of them survived long enough to die of radiation poisoning or be executed by the cylons? She did not know. It had long before ceased to matter. All that did was her things, her place on the floor to sleep, the meager food they received and a small sense of security from knowing her immediate neighbors. That she would not have here. Not yet. She would keep the things in her bag untouched until she did, or she would not sleep.

They settled on the space, a little more room than the last place but too open and chilly. They delivered things through the room and she hoped they'd not really want them there. But she settled in her blanket, her treasures beneath her pillow.

Food would come soon. If the things they ate could be properly called that. But they'd been very very hungry before the algae and she no longer cared. The room grew more quiet, the others working having gone, except for the several left to watch. Then this was probably just a temporary place.

Then a voice, and . . . .

"Shandie?"

It was almost whispered. She was tired and hungry and nervous about their new place and didn't know if she'd imagined it. But she knew the voice if she could just find the memory.

Opening her eyes she looked at the speaker. Dirty and beaten down, thin and hungry, she should not know this woman. But then . . . .

"Cessa?"

The woman nearly collapsed, tears pouring down her face. Shandie could not believe it. Everyone they knew was gone, and dead and forgotten. Even old friends from school. But she looked at the face, the *eyes* and tears poured out down her cheeks as well.

She sat up and they hugged. They were more than acquaintance, less than best friends, but somewhere in-between in that loose place where *friend* is used to describe what isn't complete. But they'd gone to a few movies together and shared classes and gone out for 3am breakfasts studying for finals.

Cessa had almost collapsed from the emotion and Shandie was about to. The rush of memories was too hard. To remember the world that was gone, that had been taken away would make this place too hard to endure. The past was over and the only thing that existed for them was the now.

Except the odds of meeting someone you'd known, even a casual friend, were impossible. And yet this was Cessa and she was really here. She tried to remember some little detail of *then*, but stopped. Only the now, only *today* was real here. But this was, too.

"I didn't think," said Cessa finally, sitting up. "It wasn't possible," she mumbled, her voice trailing off.

Shandie just held her, gently and they cried. Then she remembered that they had believed that the *possible* was what you made yourself. "But we proved that wrong before."

They'd gotten the school to put in a garden one year. They were told there was no space, that it was not needed, that the school did not teach agriculture. But they had persisted, insisting the students and community would benefit anyway. She had stood with Cessa as the first shovels had been dug that day. It had grown over time to be a thing of pride. Before the cylons had reduced the area to ash, it was still there.

It had come to stand for hope when things were bad. She remembered the brightness of the fruits and the smattering of green and browns beneath them, a hint of a smile showing. Cessa must have been remembering too.

"And one day, we'll make another garden," said Cessa.

They shared one last hug and separated enough that they would not lose their full space, but as she settled into her blanket, she was filled this day with joy. Beside her her friend was still smiling. She knew they would never lose each other again.

Shandie had had nothing before, a case of clothes she guarded and a stubborn will to go on. But now, she had *someone*. Now, she had memories she could share. Now, she was richer than all the others on the old ship.

Now, she knew she was really alive.


End file.
